Quick notes: Outbound travel | Comac C919...

• Outbound travel: Indian travelers are searching for international trips faster than travelers in any other market in the world. Last year, Indian travelers spent 20% more than the average Chinese customer on accommodations for their international travels. "Indians like to stay in four- or five-star accommodations, and at branded hotels."



• India Chooses Arm's Neoverse for National Chip Design Push: C-DAC's Aum Arm accelerator promises 96 ARM cores to beat even supercomputers.



• Try a hard-headed China policy for a change: Despite six decades of experience of Chinese behaviour, India has willfully suspended its disbelief and, by way of a default policy, accepted new sets of promises and commitments to maintain peace and harmony on the border. Beijing plays for time and tests India’s patience, straight facedly repeating the stock phrases about India, in effect, needing to move on and, by the by, to help the Chinese economy get back on its feet by accepting increased Chinese exports even if it means exacerbating the current trade deficit of some $70 billion!
  
  For starters, instead of tippy-toeing around the option, New Delhi has to begin actually applying the tourniquet on bilateral trade, gradually closing off market access, firstly, to Chinese light manufactures and capital consumer goods (mobile telephones of every description, MG cars, Haier household goods — airconditioners, washing machines, etc.) and, secondly, shutting the door on the Chinese teleecom giants — Huawei, ZTE, etc... Recently Vodafone chose the Chinese company ZTE’s 5-G transmission gear worth Rs 220 crore to upgrade its network.



• China's C919 passenger plane enters into service: The 164-seater still relies heavily on Western components, including engines and avionics.. State-owned AVIC Aircraft supplies structural components like wing boxes and flaps; Sichuan Chengfei Integration Technology provides parts and component; and advanced materials manufacturer Western Superconducting Technologies supplies titanium alloys.



• France bans short-haul flights: "On average, the plane emits 77 times more CO2 per passenger than the train on these routes, even though the train is cheaper and the time lost is limited to 40 minutes".



• Big apple is sinking: The ground under New York City is sinking partly due to the sheer mass of all its buildings – and it isn't the only coastal city to be suffering this fate.



• British loot: Greece recovers hundreds of looted artefacts, including bronze statue of Alexander the Great, from disgraced British art dealer Robin Symes



• Khalistan goons: Sikhs in London are scared

Quick notes: Ghar wapsi | Securing the Northeast...

• "His job is to protect his Godhood": Amazing talk by Mary Suresh Iyer, ex-Christian

. . If possible, watch at 1.5 speed . .


• Trying to escape justice: Catholic church attempts to stop one of its own priests from suing it for child abuse



• Ahom warriors defeated the Mughals 17 times: Support the brave Assamese. They are our best bet to secure the Northeast. Bad idea to make them a minority in their own land. At the least, make sure Bengalis learn Assamese language and assimilate.

  What Sharjeel Imam revealed is a 120 year old Islamist project
  
  In 1906 Nawab Salimullah (founding member of Muslim League) exhorted Muslims to migrate to Assam enmasse declaring- "that land which our ancestors could not win by sword would be conquered by us without sword" https://t.co/TlmgA5BP4v

  — True Indology (@TIinExile) January 26, 2020

  
  


• The Nambi Narayanan Story: The motive for the fake spy scandal against him and the five others remains a mystery. Was it a conspiracy by rivals to scuttle India's development of cryogenic tech?



• Chinese espionage: Harvard professor charged with hiding China ties. Officials have repeatedly warned about China's ambitious Thousand Talents program. “No country poses a greater threat to our national security and economic prosperity than China. Their goal is to replace the U.S. as  world superpower, and they are breaking the law to get there”. 



• BSL-4 biolab in Wuhan: How possible is it that the Wuhan coronavirus originated from Wuhan's maximum-security biolab? . . . . . Does China have a clandestine offensive biological weapons (BW) program? . . . . False rumors circulating on the Chinese internet claim the virus is part of a U.S. conspiracy to spread germ weapons.



• Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors: One 16th of the size of a major power station



• Religion of Peace: How Sikhs saved their women from Muslim mobs during Partition of 1947




• Victimhood is a Mohammedan Birth-Right: How can a Hindu or a Sikh or a Buddhist ever be a victim? That will make Allah angry.

I wish that even a fraction of the concern & solidarity media liberals are showering on Shaheenbagh protestors had been shown towards those who fled religious persecution from Pak/ B’desh. Those unfortunate Mathuas, Namasudras & Chakmas were far away from Delhi & hence forgotten

— Swapan Dasgupta (@swapan55) January 26, 2020

Quick notes: Free-trade champions | Paki exports...

• Beware of Hans bearing Free-Trade gifts: Data show that China itself imposes the largest number of non-tariff measures (NTMs) on India, more than any other country.



• FTA hit on direct taxes: The point often missed is that the govt of the importing country tends to lose that much revenue by way of lost direct taxes (corporate tax on profits, personal/corporate income taxes on salaries, interest and rent) which it could have gathered had these goods been manufactured within India. The govt should levy a withholding tax on imports equivalent to the loss in domestic direct taxes such imports cause.



• China enables Pakistan to become a defense exporter: Myanmar Air Force released pictures of four JF-17s that it had purchased from Pakistan. The deal was facilitated by China, which gave the country credit to eventually acquire 16 JF-17s.. Pakistan discussed future sales to Malaysia and Azerbaijan as well as sales of additional fighters to Nigeria, which now has three JF-17s.



• Drone Swarms: The high-tech future of war. A large number of cheap drones could be very useful for fighter planes.



• The warrior in us: Guru Gobind Singh conceived and implemented the idea of the militant order of the Khalsa—as a brotherhood of soldier-saints, pledged to invoke the name of the almighty, protect the weak, engage in charity and fight oppression. The distinct identity and appearance of the Khalsa ensured that they stood and fought, rather than take the easy way out. This moral binding added to the constant persecution by the Mughals and the experience gained in minor conflicts made the Sikh soldier what he became in the latter half of the 18th century—a war-winning force. For the next century, he was to remain in a state of relentless war, resulting in the Sikhs carving out an empire of their own.
  
  The martyrdom of Banda Singh Bahadur, Guru Gobind Singh’s political and military successor, in 1716 added the proverbial fuel to the fire, further fanning the Sikh ‘warrior’ passions. The warrior spirit sustained and continued to grow. They were able to strike at will, not only at the Mughal armies but also at new invaders from Central Asia.



• Something’s burning: The extensive cultivation of paddy in Punjab and Haryana is central to the problem. Being a water intensive crop (1 kilogram of rice consumes 3,000-5,000 kg of water), the two States have sought to reduce groundwater drawals in the dry April-May period by mandating that paddy cultivation can only begin around mid-June.  This has pushed the harvest date by six weeks to October when it is almost time to plant the rabi crop. The fields need to be cleared in a hurry, and stubble and straw burning is simply the fastest and cheapest way to do it



• Life-threatening 'Vikas': Air pollution has cut short lives of Indo-Gangetic plain residents by seven years. There has been a 72% increase in pollution from 1998 to 2016 in the region. . . . . . . .  PM 2.5 pollutants are toxic and so small that these beat the body's defences and settle deep into lungs from where these spread to the bloodstream and other organs causing inflammation and are linked to asthmatic attacks, strokes, heart attacks, even dementia.



• Desis Leave New Jersey Streets Dirty:

Ashamed to be called an Indian

Last Night on Indian Street near Journal Square New Jersey

Hats off to NJ Police handling the mess Very professionally 👏👏 pic.twitter.com/39nVmGaejO

— sANDhya (@DhooDala) October 28, 2019




• Energy storage without batteries: Pumped hydro storage, Power-to-hydrogen, Thermal storage...

Quick notes: Chinese imports, Beef in cereal...

• Imports of electronics and IT products from China:  "Many of the devices transmit, or store, data back into Chinese servers, which could pose a security risk. Also, online transactions using many of these devices and platforms can be tracked back to Chinese servers, which can create security issues for the country".



• Sigh!: India’s exports to China include iron ore, cotton yarn, petroleum products, copper and chemicals, while imports include telecom instruments, electronic components, computer hardware, industrial machinery and chemicals.



• Hindus offended: Gelatin derived from beef is used in a variety of Kellogg cereal products.



• White Jesus: Too many Christian pastors are silent on Charlottesville violence



• Sikhs in America: For more than a century, Sikhs in the U.S. have faced hate and violence.



• On Hinduism:

  Hinduism gave itself no name, because it set itself no sectarian limits; it claimed no universal adhesion, asserted no sole infallible dogma, set up no single narrow path or gate of salvation; it was less a creed or cult than a continuously enlarging tradition of the God ward endeavor of the human spirit. An immense many-sided and many staged provision for a spiritual self-building and self-finding, it had some right to speak of itself by the only name it knew, the eternal religion, Santana Dharma.
  
  Now just here is the first baffling difficulty over which the European mind stumbles; for it finds itself unable to make out what Hindu religion is.... How can there be a religion which has no rigid dogmas demanding belief on pain of eternal damnation, no theological postulates, even no fixed theology, no credo, distinguishing it from antagonistic or rival religions? How can there be a religion which has no papal head, no governing ecclesiastic body, no church, chapel or congregational system, no binding religious form of any kind obligatory on all its adherents, no one administration and discipline? For the Hindu priests are mere ceremonial officiants without any ecclesiastical authority or disciplinary powers and the Pundits are mere interpreters of the Shastra, not the law-givers of the religion or its rulers.
  
  How again can Hinduism be called a religion when it admits all beliefs, allowing even a kind of high-reaching atheism and agnosticism and permits all possible spiritual experiences, all kinds of religious adventures? -- Sri Aurobindo, India's Rebirth

Quick notes: FDI norms, UK Sikhs...

• RSS affiliate questions easing of FDI norms: “FDI study reports pertaining to 2011-12 prove that eight times the money that came in as FDI has gone out as foreign direct outflows in many ways like royalty payments made, professional and consultancy charges paid, etc.”



• Radicalization of UK Sikhs: Sikh youth trained to assemble IEDs with locally available chemicals. Such classes were earlier conducted in Guru Nanak Gurdwara, Spark Hill, Stratford, Birmingham and Gurdwara Singh Sabha, Glasgow



• Praise for Sheila Dixit: Delhi govt completes six-lane flyover project at Rs 100 cr below cost



• Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel's speech:




• aamuktamaalyada:

AmuktamAlyada is a masterpiece of telugu literature. Written in Telugu by a Tulu speaking Kannadiga King about Tamilian deity gOdA dEvi!

— K V Sarma J (@KVSarmaJ) November 11, 2015

Quick notes: Treasonous telecast, LCA for navy...

• 26/11: "We don't want any live telecast, our country is in danger": The daughter of an army man makes her second call in 21 minutes. She says newscasters are revealing critical information. “Andar ghuste hi maarenge na? (They’ll be shot as soon as they enter, right?)”



• Ghap wapsi in Punjab: Sangh works for return to Sikhism as well (...notice the misleading title in Indian Express)
  



• Indian Navy's LCA Naval Protytype 1 trials:

Quick notes: Air India's descent, Sanskrit village...

• How they killed the Maharaja: The most deadly blow to Air India and Indian Airlines came from Praful Patel’s decision to parcel out bilateral flights to select foreign airlines such as Emirates and Lufthansa.



• An entire village that talks in Sanskrit: The school in Mattur also boasts of producing toppers every year. Learning Vedas and their chanting have helped the students to focus more and has also increased their memory.



• Ungrateful University:

http://t.co/BS12wxDKPh In 1925 Birla donated Rs 70k to Aligarh Muslim University. In terms of gold prices it is worth Rs 3920cr today
— S Gurumurthy (@sgurumurthy) November 29, 2014





• Dharti Nankana Sahib Di:

Quick notes: Shubham Banerjee, UID...

• Shubham Banerjee: This 13-Year-Old Is So Impressive, Intel Is Investing Hundreds Of Thousands In His Startup




• Jayant Sinha, the man who mooted universal identification number for all Indians



• Crisil: New IT Jobs Set to Fall by 50% in Four Years



• Martyrdom of Subeg Singh and Shahbaz Singh:
  (found this on a Gurudwara wall)
  
  Subeg Singh was an influential zamindar of Jambar and a contractor for the government. Zakariya Khan, the Governor of Panjab, had used the services of Subeg Singh for his own ends many times. For instance, in 1733, Zakariya Khan had sent him to present an offer of a jagir and nawabi to the Sikhs in exchange for peace. Subeg Singh successfully negotiated with the Khalsa and persuaded them to accept the jagir.
  
  Subeg Singh had a bright and promis-ing son named Shahbaz Singh. As there were no Sikh schools in those days, Shahbaz Singh studied in a Muslim school. There, a great conflict arose between Sikhs and Muslims, and the teachers con-demned Sikhism. Shahbaz Singh strongly defended his faith and criticized Islam for forcibly converting men belonging to other religions. The matter was reported to the Qazi who delivered the usual judge-ment: embrace Islam or face death. The boy refused bluntly to abandon his faith and embrace Islam. He was sent to Lahore to stand his trial before the Governor.
  
  Subeg Singh approached Zakariya Khan and the chief Qazi with a request to release his son, as he was innocent. But Zakariya Khan refused to interfere in the case and the chief Qazi also turned a deaf ear to him. In frustration, Subeg Singh used some harsh words and left. Later, he was arrested on a trumped-up charge of supplying information to the Sikhs and put under restraint. Zakariya Khan died before punishing Subeg Singh and Shahbaz Singh. His son, Yahiya Khan, became the Governor of Lahore and was as relentless as his father, but more cruel. He had no soft corner for Subeg Singh or Shahbaz Singh. He therefore took up their cases and pursued them with zeal. After putting up a show of a trial, both father and son were asked to embrace Islam or face death. They bluntly refused. The Governor ordered their executions by crushing them on the wheels. Subeg Singh and Shahbaz Singh were taken to Nakhas and publicly tortured. The chief Qazi advised Subeg Singh to accept Islam and save his, and his son's life, but Subeg Singh refused defiantly. At this the chief Qazi ordered Shahbaz Singh to be crushed on the wheels.
  
  When Shahbaz Singh was put on the wheel, both father and son started shouting 'Akal! Akal! Akal!'. After sometime the voice of Shahbaz Singh, who was being turned on the wheel, became feeble. The wheel was stopped and the Qazi asked him if he would yield to embrace Islam. His father, realizing that his son may be losing his strength, promptly looked into his eyes and asked him to repeat 'Akal! Akal! Akal!' loudly.
  
  The boy's spirit soared! He was himself again and started shouting 'Akal! Akal! Akal!' The wheel, with its slashing knives, went on moving until Shahbaz Singh's soul left his body for its heavenly abode. Subeg Singh was also crushed on the wheels. He breathed his last with cheerful-ness and his soul rose to the realm of Truth. (article courtesy Dr. Santokh Singh - "The Guru's Word")

Quick notes: Kaangress pogrom, pollution capital...

• Kaangress pogrom: ‘Rajiv Gandhi didn’t take calls from President after 1984 riots broke out. 2002 riots were spontaneous in contrast to the 1984 riots.’



• Delhi's air is dirtier than Beijing's: In Beijing, PM-10 levels decreased about 40 per cent from 2000 to 2013; in Delhi this has increased about 47 per cent from 2000 to 2011. The main culprit is the addition of 1,000 vehicles daily.



• Diesel subsidy: Commercial vehicles, and not agriculture, are the biggest beneficiary of diesel subsidy.

• Malaysian Chinese guy, student of late DK Pattammal

Quick notes: Turban Myths, Weaver's Hut...

• Panjab University receives very good scores for citation impact, which means its academics are producing research widely used and valued by the academic community around the world. India's top university.



• Almost all men in the U.S. who wear turbans are Sikh Americans. Americans believe “Sikh” is a sect of Islam. Standford.edu: Post-9/11 “Turban Myths” in America



• Judge tells Sikh man, 'Remove That Rag'



• Workers at Cooper Tire's China joint venture have been striking for about three months against India's Apollo tires' deal to buy Cooper. Workers' right to strike there might be restricted to foreign owned businesses.



• Mercury is hardly used in Japan but high concentrations have been detected at the peak of Mt. Fuji due to contaminated air flowing over from China. China's latest export.



• Other uses of Coconut: Carbon from coconut shell is in high demand in the manufacture of Supercapacitors, like the one used in the latest Mazda-3's i-Eloop system.



• Bano Fatima, with her cousin Nabila Kidwai, established Weaver's Hut, a small-scale social enterprise: 22-yr-old helps weavers, wins global award.

Quick notes: Silent Revolution, Nordic backlash..

• Rahul baba has ushred in a 'silent revolution' and Kaangress now has a lock on rural Indian vote, this guy at Bloomberg wants you to believe.



• Nordic backlash against pesky Mohammedans. Far right and far left on the rise in Europe.



• Sikhs pay for RoP crimes: Sikh Professor attacked in NYC, mistaken for a Mohammedan.

Love jihad and other crimes against humanity

British Sikh girls are being preyed upon by gangs of Muslim men who subject them to horrific sexual abuse, a BBC Inside Out investigation has uncovered.  In many cases the men deceive the girls into believing that they are Sikh to gain their trust.  Desperate to hide their secret for fear of bringing shame to their families, girls are often forced to leave home.

Six men were jailed at Leicester Crown Court last week for offences including facilitating child prostitution. The convictions are being heralded as a legal landmark because it is the first high-profile case involving a Sikh victim of sexual abuse which has led to convictions in the UK.

BBC: British Sikh girls exposed to sexual grooming by gangs

Quick notes: Sikh girls targeted, Swadeshi returns...

• RoP Paedophile gangs target Sikh girls: BBC’s Inside Out has broadcast a 30-minute investigation into the abuse of Sikh girls in UK. Sikh families feel powerless on how to deal with it.



• Seven-year-old girl sexually assaulted by Madrasa teacher : Most of the ELM looks the other way



• Francois Gautier: Today we have the #soniagandhian Era, where names of rapists are not disclosed for fear of ‘communal’ riots, where statues of Shivaji Maharaj are removed by the police not to antagonize other communities, but where Bollywood gets away with the crassest vulgarity & violence, crude sexual suggestiveness, rape scenes, unimpeded use of white women that give the idea to the Indian youth that white women are easy, and where the word ‘Allah’ is inserted cleverly in every three couplets !



• Back to reality? Swadeshi making a come back : As a nation we are living beyond our means and you can’t continue doing so unless we want India to crash.



• Water ATMs:  Anand Shah's Sarvajal, backed by the Piramal Foundation, has built a business off of developing franchise-run water filtration and distribution services in rural areas of India. The devices have some 25 sensors, which manage and monitor water pressure and filtration, and make maintenance and repair of the systems low cost and easy. It is now in the process of launching newly-developed connected ATM-style systems that can distribute low cost, clean water.



• SoC for wearables - Indian startup Ineda licenses MIPS processor cores and PowerVR graphics IP from Imagination Technologies.

Chak De Goal!

The weekly Punjabi broadcast of “Hockey Night in Canada,” is the only N.H.L. game called in a language other than English or French.

“Chak de phatte goooooaaaalllll Joffrey Lupul! Torrrrronto Maple Putayyy!”  

NYT: Chak De Goal! A Punjabi Broadcast Draws In New Hockey Fans

US Sikh Group: Deny Entry Visa to Sonia

A group representing Sikhs in the US has written to Hillary Clinton asking that Sonia Gandhi be denied entry into the US, because she has shielded fellow party members from prosecution after they led mob attacks which killed thousands of Sikhs in 1984, following her mother-in-law's assassination.

The US should answer as to why they recently allowed the criminal Sonia Gandhi to enter the US when she came to get medical treatment.

US Court Summons Congress Over 1984 Riots

Like its Pakistani counterpart the ISI, it's now the turn of India's ruling Congress Party to face a summons by a US court, as part of a lawsuit filed by Sikh victims of the 1984 riots. Since Congress partymen place loyalty to their party over loyalty to country, it will be interesting to see their response to these developments.

Sikhs in NW Pak Told to Flee or Convert

Here's a story in TIME about Sikhs being forced to convert or flee from Taliban-dominated northwest Pakistan.

'Ragheads' and Republicans

CNN has an op-ed piece entitled 'Ragheads' and Republicans: Is Sikhism a sickness?

I think we all know what the answer to that is. The rednecks have their own sickness going on, and it may in fact be incurable. It is the built-in insularity of the American Right that keeps them continually trailing the Left in the polls. It's only when they outgrow their infantilism that they'll be able to outflank the Left by reaching out in the directions they need to.

Taliban beheads 3 Sikhs: does Manmohan Singh care?

NEW DELHI: In what threatens to cast a shadow on the upcoming Indo-Pakistan talks scheduled for February 25, three Sikh youths were beheaded by the Taliban in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) region after they allegedly refused to convert to Islam. Their severed heads were dumped at a gurudwara in Peshawar.

The Sikh youths — identified as Jaspal Singh, Sarabjit Singh and Baronat Singh — had gone to realise the money owed to them by some people in the FATA region adjoining Afghanistan, when they were abducted by the Taliban militia. They were allegedly told by the Taliban to embrace Islam or face death. When the Sikh youth refused, their heads were chopped and sent to the Bhai Joga Singh Gurudwara in Peshawar.

A sizeable number of Sikhs lived in the tribal belt, particularly Aurakzai Agency, till the Taliban imposed jiziya or religious tax on them in 2009. Most members of the community, faced with increasing pressure from the Taliban to convert to Islam, have since fled to cities across Pakistan.

Of course, Manmohan Singh does not lose any sleep over a mere pinprick like this. "People-to-People contact", "Cultural exchange", "Cross-border trade" and "COMPOSITE DIALOGUE" must go on - at *ALL* costs, at *ANY* cost.

Manmohan's Home minister has responded with an outrageous declaration that "Pakistan is India's Most important neighbour", while simultaneously laying the foundation stone for infrastructure that will do nothing but facilitate payments of Jaziya by Dhimmi India to the Jihadi state of Pakistan.

Chidambaram's policy of enabling Jaziya payments apparently followed a meeting with Mehbooba Mufti.

The Home Minister assured her that adequate banking facilities were in the offing and he expected branches of Jammu and Kashmir Bank would be opened in Azad Kashmir soon, the spokesman said.Chidambaram also assured that appropriate measures would be taken for creating infrastructure facilities at the trade centres ....

Wonder what the UPA dhimmis have for that ugly, hideous Dukhtran-e-Millat Jihadi creature? Meekly acquiescing to her every seditious wish without a word. The Jihadi Mufti's daughter is obviously lacking in every possible aspect of feminine charm. Could it be that the UPA honchos, Shivraj Patil earlier and Harvard "educated" Chidambaram now - have some kind of BDSM thing going on? Because the UPA's ministers
indulge in a gradual surrender of national sovereignty over Kashmir in response to
the Niqab'd she-Jihadi's whip cracking.